Post navigation

eat a cookie

Like a lot of you folks, I was unaware this year, 2012, is the 100th anniversary of Oreo Cookies. I only became aware of it on June 25th, when Nabisco took what turned out to be a controversial step forward. On that day, in celebration of Gay Pride Month, they released this advert:

The ad, of course, delighted an awful lot of gay and gay-friendly straight folks. It was fun and funny, clever without being twee, and expressed a political and social position. That’s a lot to include in a simple advertisement.

Predictably, it caused an uproar among religious conservatives and homophobes. While liberals applauded, conservatives vowed to boycott Oreos specifically and Nabisco products in general. They swore would give their custom to Hydrox cookies — apparently unaware that Hydrox had gone out of business. It was a classic temper tantrum.

Kraft Foods, which makes Oreo cookies, rightly refused to back down. They released the following statement: “Kraft Foods has a proud history of celebrating diversity and inclusiveness. We feel the Oreo ad is a fun reflection of our values.”

What is just as cool — and what has sadly been overlooked — is that for the next 100 days Oreo celebrated their centennial anniversary by releasing an interesting new advert each day, commemorating some event. Here’s a sample:

The ad campaign was known as The Daily Twist. They used multiple agencies and a dedicated team of four designers to come up with these clever ads, and sadly not nearly enough people saw them.

So here’s your chance to make up for that. Go buy some Oreos. Support the company. Remind them that we appreciate their willingness to do what’s right instead of what’s safe. Eat some cookies in a good cause.

You know, Oreos are pretty tasty for a store-bought cookie, but I can’t recall the last time I bought any. I’ll buy some periodically now, in the same way and for the same reason I try to buy books by Southern writers. I just want to show my support, even if there are better products out there. I’ll try to balance it out by buying Oreos from a locally owned mom-and-pop store.